Grandes maneouvres et petits soldats

GRAND DECEPTIONS is one of the earliest of the comeback Columbo episodes, following on from the superior SEX AND THE MARRIED DETECTIVE. This one's a little dry and stilted for a Columbo episode, not to mention that the military setting is overly familiar from earlier and better instalments (like BY DAWN'S EARLY LIGHT).

The murder is a typical one with a military angle, but it takes forever to get going and about half an hour of screen time has passed until we get to the meat of the detective investigation. Although the running time overall is only an hour and a half, this story feels very slow and it's a little too serious for its own good; there's no goofiness here, and even though Columbo's dog makes a cameo, he doesn't get to do much.

Falk is on fine fettle, but I find that Columbo is only as good as his opponents, and Robert Foxworth as the guest villain is a bit of a bore, far too straight-laced to make an impact. Andy Romano (ERASER) as the victim is much better, as Stephen Elliott playing the old-time general. But, in the end, GRAND DECEPTIONS is a very ordinary and average-feeling Columbo story, with a completely spurious ending, and certainly not one to remember.